


The Thing About It

by sksdwrld



Series: Comment_Fic and Drabble-prompt fills [33]
Category: Merlin (TV)
Genre: Depending on Your Interpretation, Gen, Implied Sexual Content, Implied/Referenced Torture, implied BDSM, tone is dark in any case
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-05-10
Updated: 2014-05-10
Packaged: 2018-01-24 05:27:20
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 443
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1593227
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sksdwrld/pseuds/sksdwrld
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Uther is fascinated by flesh.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Thing About It

Flesh. It was a marvelous and wondrous thing: resilient and pliable yet delicate...Uther liked it in all of its many forms.

Untouched, it was pale, soft, smooth, like a fresh tome -just waiting for a story to be written, carefully and gently with a feather or in hurried dashes and jabs, ink and wax spilling into the crevices.

Any number of words, be they cutting remarks or whispered promises of debauchery, were capable of changing flesh from creamy and cool to a warm pink, like the center of a well-prepared roast that Uther ached to get his teeth into.

When words weren't enough, a hand would do, bringing the heat to the surface with one slap or many; and if not a hand, then a paddle, a flogger, the braided tail of a whip, a thin and unforgiving switch. Each would leave their own marks and reminders of obedience. Of sworn fealty to Camelot's iron-fisted king.

The abuse could extend farther when necessary and Uther had a myriad of blades at his disposal, from hunting knives to decorative daggers, and a number of needles, awls, and spikes. With just the right amount of pressure, flesh yielded to him and spilled its secrets: all blood was red and all men, sooner or later, beg with tears in their eyes and moans on their lips.

What was perhaps most interesting of all was the bruise. Sharp edged or irregular and purple-black, sometimes even shiny...over time it faded to mottled blue then a sickly green and yellow before fading away altogether. A fresh slate to start anew.

It was amusing that a single threat -one of death- could chase one's color completely away, shades of ghostly grey and white foretelling the future as well as any witch or sorceress.

And of course, he could never forget that fire alone rendered his beloved flesh to blackened ash, a greasy soot that smeared his courtyard and stained his withered heart.

Uther liked to ponder the marvels of flesh as he sat on his throne, looking over the men and women of his court. He thought about it while condemning the guilty and overseeing their pyre. He considered it while gamey juices dripped down his chin. But in his chambers, he didn't have to fantasize. It was there that Uther conducted his experiments and tests. He wrote theories and conducted symphonies in flesh.

Camelot was a large kingdom, richer in flesh than gold, and Uther was a wealthy, wealthy man. Flesh could be given, taken, traded, stolen, sold. It was pleasure and pain, life and death, sustenance and starvation. It was a marvelous and wondrous thing. Flesh.


End file.
